He did walk in to hear Ashton call his daughter a name. And the principal did try to send Selkie away so that she couldn’t talk to Trunchbull herself and present her evidence (not that he knew she had it). He also wanted her phone, and likely would have deleted the evidence on there.

It probably has happened before. So yeah. I’m actually really glad to see Todd say something. Especially after his daughter was punished and Truck wasn’t.

It will likely come in the form of a principal who is actively out to get Selkie. Imagine if it was a biology professor who has a ‘crackpot theory’ about her being non-human and tries to expose/kidnap her?

And I will say that I am HAPPY Todd did this. The problem I have with a lot of fictional protagonists is that the writers sometimes write them as flawless characters who never make a mistake and always come out on top. But Dave has done a fantastic job of making each character feel like a HUMAN BEING. They have character flaws, wants and desires, the ‘antagonists’ have human qualities that make them understandable, and they just feel like they are making choices a human would. Todd is a new father who, because of this man’s choices, was hospitalized, mentally traumatized, and punished for defending herself. I can understand him wanting to bring down every bit of wrath he had available, as covering up for the principal could also bite him in the ass later (“Todd, you know it’s a felony to lie to the police? If you don’t want me to correct that error, you’re not going to say a word about this at the PTA meetings.”) Anyway, sorry for the wall of text. Great comic as always, Dave.

I mean that’s what could have happened had Todd covered for Ashton. By covering up for him and saying nothing else happened, Ashton could have potentially used it as a leverage point later on to save his own behind (Yes, exposing his own misdeeds would have a negative effect, but it would likely have worse results for Todd, and Ashton could use the phrase “Cut off my nose to spite my face”. However, Todd decided that mercy was not on the menu today. However, for Selkie, swordfish definitely is!

To clarify, I’m not unhappy Todd’s doing this in a story sense. In an “If I knew him personally” sense, I’m disappointed. But like I said, I do understand why Todd is doing this.

If Todd had just gone right ahead and shoved Ashton toward the bus with no hesitation, I’d be really, really annoyed. Since we get to see the internal debate, it does make this more believable. Like Neo, said, Todd’s a believable human being.

I wonder if Todd realizes that the police usually don’t deal with how things are handled in the yard unless it’s due to direct violence. I don’t really believe the Principal has been directly abusive to the students even if he is a dick.

Reality is office or school yard politics are not the police’s district, Todd is implying some serious allegations here. I wonder, if the officer’s face from interest in what Todd has to say or is it more of “really? why are you wasting my time?” face. Police usually don’t like having their time wasted being jerked around.

Police would be likely to investigate possible abuse, though. It’s true that the Principal has been intimidating the staff into silence – going so far as to fire outspoken teachers. Investigation into incidents of possible violence to the students that was being deliberately swept under the rug might be something the police would consider worth looking at more closely.

the way i read the cops face is the “oohh.. DO Tell! HE obviously isn’t telling me ALL the things i need to know” kind of look, probably meaning that there have been “inconsistencies” in the principal’s story that until Todd told him from a third party point of view, weren’t important enough to the case at hand to justify further investigation… though now with Todd bringing up the possibility of it happening before, AND the look on the principals face…. yeah it moved up in the cop’s mind about needing to dig further.

I’m quite sure that the EX-gym teacher will be brought up soon enough, and possibly even getting the school staff of Truck’s previous school involved as well… even if only as a testimony at the principal’s firing (however that happens in real life) as I’m sure this will ultimately go up the the district level, now. though i foresee a whole bunch of schadenfreude happening, as the government will still want to keep things quiet because of the secrecy over the existence of the Sarnothi, therefore they’ll want absolutely nothing going to the press, and you KNOW that a case for the justified firing of a school’s Principal will attract the press like flies to honey and that will mean they’ll be scrutinizing the students and teachers under a microscope… after which, the discrepancies about Selkie’s background with Truck and the orphanage, and therefore the existence of the Sarnothi will come out into the open… yeah, nope… it’ll quietly get dropped due to Government interference…

He isn’t telling him anything that is any of his business. Aggressive work places don’t often include police unless it involves some sort of violence; which was already being taken care of and already discussed. There’s absolutely no reason for the principal to discuss impending matters that have no effect on the current situation. It isn’t the police officer’s role to fire the principal.

How the school handles punishments is at the discretion of the school as well, there’s nothing there for the police to get involved in. My sister was punished for something she didn’t at school too so my Mother pulled her out.

The principal looks like that because the police are involved and Todd is suggesting some pretty heavy allegations here, ones which, if not proven to be true, could actually be considered defamation of character and even earn him a law suit.

I am interested to see how the police in THIS comic react to Todd, because where I live, they’d be involved up to the bully and physical violence and be out. There’s an entirely different group of people in place to deal with the rest of the shit that’s been going on in school and frankly it’s a waste of resources for the police to continue to peruse it.

Wait, you’ve blacklisted words but “fucking” isn’t on the list? Because I am clearly seeing the f-word up there.

I don’t know that the comments need to be quite so clean as the comic, but I still take this to be a family-friendly comic (which is why I’m thrilled you didn’t back down about the cypher-swearing), and family-friendly webcomics with stories that are worth reading to my nieces and nephews are rare fare these days.

I don’t know if it’d put the principal/school under a microscope, necessarily. The principal at my kid’s junior high racked up a second DWI and was fired, and while it made the news, it wasn’t OMG LOOK AT EVERYTHING. There might be more scrutiny over someone who was firing staff, true, but unless there was some speculation he was personally abusing the kids, or soliciting wink-wink-nudge-nudge-ahem-“favors” from the teachers… Eh, it could be kept minor, betcha.

it’s not so much as “everything” being under a microscope, but when a Principal is fired the press is, of course, going to want to know WHY… OK, so far. the reason: a kid was beat up and later had to go to the hospital for it… again, OK so far… BUT, the press will dig and dig, and dig until they find out WHO that “kid” was… and when they find out about it being Selkie… yeah, i can imagine the feedback over that revelation… THAT”S what the Government DOESN’T want to have happen… therefore they will pull some strings, and get him “reassigned” or have him “take a sabbatical” so there isn’t any press involved, they’ll get him out of the position and away from the kids, but the given reasons will be anything BUT him getting “FIRED”… that way they don’t have to take measures to cover-up any MORE Sarnothi related stuff than they really have to. but I’ll bet that they won’t tell Todd that they are doing something like that though, and all he will see is that the Principal is “getting away with it” and he’ll try to push the issue…

Sure, but without Todd’s statements the cops don’t know that there’s anything to be investigated. What the authorities may do with the information is one thing, but if these things were happening at my child’s school I would want them brought to light. Safe bet that the parents don’t know their kids school is coddling bullies and sweeping violence and harassment under the rug for the sake of propping up their public image.

I don’t see a problem here. Todd is telling the truth and asking a very valid question. I notice the bullying of the orphans as a whole has gone remarkably unpunished and unremarked upon. Like with the Trunchbullls, the principal may be caving to parents of those kids…after all, who is sticking up for the orphans? Their caretakers don’t have the same “power”.

It’s true. My adopted siblings were bullied by the school system, the teachers and principal thinking they could get away with it just because my siblings were previously in state care.

And also, in the comic, Heather was not punished by the school for stealing Selkie’s shirt. The Fairweathers just happened to be good enough people to punish their daughter, even before they knew it was an employee’s child who was “special needs”. They made sure she understood why it was wrong for her to do what she did.

But Ashton never punished Heather. He instead fired the teacher. Which, by the way, was uncalled for. One man over 30 some odd kids? There was no way he’d be able to keep track of them all at all times.

Well, to be fair to the Principal, I don´t blame him for not punishing Heather, because it was abundantly clear that her parents were going to punish her rather thoroughly.

On the other hand, I got the impression that the gym teacher was fired not for Selkie´s shirt, but because he insisted that the one the Principal was going to blame for the whole incident – Keisha – was innocent.

Now it’s time to see what kind of repercussions occur for not going the route of discretion being the better part of valor… and what unintended consequences there will be.
Will the interim school administrator be even worse than the principal? Will someone try and turn it around on Todd, or even take revenge, be it subtle or obvious?
Righteous indignation and revenge is great… just be smart about it, damn it.

Not only will Selkie still have to deal with the principal, but he’s actually being unfair to Ashton: Trunchbull actually got staff fired at a previous school and was threatening to do the same here. Ashton is a victim of Trunchbull, the father, the same way Selkie is a victim of Trunchbull, the son, and the fact that Prof. Trunchbull is so self-righteous and believes he’s better (because he eschews physical violence in favour of manipulation and making people lose their jobs) just makes him a worse bully.

If you look at Todd’s thought process in the previous page, he’s effectively trying to make himself as important as Prof. Trunchbull by also picking on Trunchbull’s victims. It’s…effective, social groups working as they do, but would generally be considered morally wrong, certainly harmful.

And to compound things, in the last panel he’s falling into angry rhetoric instead of sticking to the facts (which would already be damning enough for the principal). Ashton will probably conclude that Todd is not just upset about what happened to his kid, but actually out to get the principal.

Remember when Trunchbull leaned over Ashton’s desk and claimed there were no witnesses? Remember when Ashton agreed, EVEN THOUGH HE HAD WITNESSES. Then Ashton prepared for his next meeting with Trunchbull by trying to get all the witnesses out of his office.

The Trunchbull’s are bullies, father and son, but Ashton is far worse than a coward – he is a bully’s enabler. The Prof is at least capable of changing his mind when presented with evidence. The Principal’s only concern about evidence is trying to suppress any that would inconvenience him.

Yeah, I’m a bit confused by all these “Wish he hadn’t sunk so low” comments here. Ashton has done some pretty negative things, some of them were related to the case at hand (the one which ended in a hospital visit and therefore the one the police are concerned about), and there’s a pattern of lack-of-backbone through several interactions here. It’s imperative that the guy in charge of a place actually have a backbone and stand up for the children (and staff!) in his care; if not him, who else?

It may be that the police aren’t interested in part of what Todd is saying, it may be that there are some repercussions from a pissed-off principal, but I don’t in any way think Todd should’ve been quiet or should’ve couched his words better than he did. And although Ashton certainly was looking at the Trunchbulls causing trouble, I don’t see him as a victim here, or as a man who had no reasonable choice but to do what he did.

The Police have absolutely no business in this matter. The Principal is well within his rights to dole out punishment as he sees fit. If Todd has a problem, he should be going to the of Education, not the police. They’re the ones who can fire the principal.

But the devil on the shoulder wasn’t being the voice of reason. It was trying to tempt Todd into a major mistake. There is likely systemic issues of bullying here that the principal is covering up. The devil wants him to do as little as possible.

I agree that the police will not be involved unless violence is happening. However, telling the police might be the ticket to involve the School Board. Now the School Board would be VERY interested in the principals actions!

you are in the dark just as much as the rest of us… various theories include: it’s casual day at the office. he’s an actor in a movie/play/skit/whatever and is in costume. he was LARPing, and surprise on all of us, but he actually IS a Commanding Officer in Star Fleet and that’s his daily uniform! 😀

I believe the officer is showing interest because…..
1. A principle who actively covers up child abuse is a felony. That’s not just an internal issue, it’s accomplice.
2. The officer may have a child of his own. If the ones watching over your kids are crooked, you MAKE it your job to investigate.
3. He could just be a good cop who listens to those he protects, then turns over anything he feels worth investigating to his CO who decides if the DA needs to get involved, or if further investigation is even warranted. That’s right, good cops respect the people and show concern or interest is what they say. It helps people to respect the police and become willing to help officers.

Everybody forgets: demons will seduce you, or spoil the milk, or ruin the crops, or possess a young girl, or commit the occasional murder if they get the chance.

Angels cauterize cities.

And like the angels, Todd’s wrath is no more than what was called for by a higher authority. After all, what is Todd doing here? He’s answering the questions asked by the police with the true facts as he knows them. Plus a little speculation based on those true facts, but that’s neither baseless nor hard for the cop to recognize.

Was he supposed to withhold that information so he could spring it in the PTA meeting? That would be the worst thing he could do. If there’s any chance this could go to court, he wants everything entered into the legal record ASAP. And let’s not even get into the nightmare that could result if he withheld information, and later the police come knocking on his door saying “It’s very interesting you didn’t tell us about this, sir. Is there anything else you’re hiding?”

Yes, this is vengeance. But it’s also the safest course of action for him to take. Getting all of the information out into the open and into the police’s records as soon as possible could save him a whole world of trouble later.

the police is one thing and the pta is another but with todd blowing the whistle, the teacher’s union and probably social services will want some pointed words with the principal. and the school board will be looking for the biggest runoveriest bus they can find to throw him under.

i don’t have much time for revenge or punishment, but getting someone who is complicit in endangering students and hampering their education permanently out of a position to do so

i agree with that thought about getting him out of the way of the kids… quite a while back i said something similar, in that he had been “promoted to his level of incompetence” meaning that while he MAY have been an excellent VICE-Principal, and the school board wanted to keep him around, so they promoted him… unfortunately, he’s just NOT Principal material, thus, we have this cluster-F… hopefully this blows over soon ™ and life will go on for all concerned, and be a little bit better as well… though i think there will be EXTREME Dwama when Selkie and Amanda (i think) find out they’re now sisters!

Just binge archive reading here; this is the sort of thing that needs addressing on all levels. It is not a matter of petty vengeance on Todd’s part.
Proper reports must be made to all the authorities. One cannot pick and choose with something so serious: An adult whose JOB is to keep children safe who DOESN’T, and criminally so, must be be charged by law as well as be investigated by the employers.
In Ontario, it is law and duty for teachers to report suspected abuse of a child. I suspect that to be fairly universal across North America.